Dubai: $31 billion of real estate in first five months

A total of AED 117billion ($31 billion) in real estate transactions took place in Dubai in the first five months of 2010, according to figures from the land department.

The highest number of transactions were in sales and mortgages raised against real estate, according to the data. It says there were 3,462 sale transactions registered in that period, with a total value of AED 25 billion.

Buyers spent AED 29 billion on apartments and funded an additional AED 8 billion of spending on this form of housing through mortgages.

While these figs are encouraging , what about the status of the millions of dirhmas of investors funds held by developors on projects where no construction has even started even after 2-3 years of launch. These projects were to be evaluated & cancelled by RERA as per their announcement in June 2009.Investors were to get full refund if project has been cancelled by RERA. Until today, that list of 27 ‘cancelled ‘ projects has not been released by RERA & not a single project has been announced as Cancelled.

Refund of investors funds in such cases will go a logn way in restoring investor confidence in the local market.